Kolkata votes ‘not so peacefully’

The incident happened around 4 pm. Congress workers had put up a road block at Girish Park crossing, alleging that the TMC had rigged the polls with the help of hired goons. Senior police officials arrived at the scene to disperse the crowd. A group of TMC workers, who too had arrived by then, entered into a heated argument with the Congress workers. While the police successfully dispersed the mob from the spot, the two groups took their scuffle to Rajendra Mullick Street where the S-I was hit by a bullet on his shoulder.

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Later, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Commissioner of Police Surajit Kar Purakayastha visited the officer at the hospital. Coming out of the hospital, Mamata said, “There was a scuffle at Girish Park and the S-I got injured. Thank god he is safe now. His wife and daughter have come to the hospital. Doctors will decide whether the operation would be performed on him today or not.”

The CM also said that the polling was “overall peaceful” other than a few stray incidents of violence. “Election took place at 144 wards. Only 4-5 small incidents took place. It has been a very peaceful election and the police can be given ‘the man of the match’ award,” she said.

TMC and Congress candidates of Ward 25, where the incident happened, blamed each other. Smita Bakshi, the ruling party’s candidate, said, “For the last three days, I had information that workers of BJP, Congress and CPM had been planning to create trouble today. I had informed officers at the Girish Park police station but they didn’t take any action. The S-I was hit by a splinter of a bomb hurled by Congress workers and not by a bullet,” Bakshi claimed.

Congress candidate Deepak Singh said the TMC workers were hurling abuses at him every time he went to a booth. “We had put up a road block in protest of their atrocities and when the TMC supporters came to attack us, Mondal, in trying to save us, got hurt,” he said.

In other incidents of violence reported from across the city, three bullets were shot at CPM candidate Fuad Halim, in central Kolkata near the Indian Museum. “I tried to protest when TMC goons began ransacking our camp office. They shot three rounds of fire at me before speeding off on a bike. I was lucky to escape unhurt,” he alleged.

TMC workers allegedly shot several rounds in front of the police at Bagha Jatin Vidyamandir in south Kolkata. The police had to resort to mild lathicharge to take control of the situation.

At Beniapukur, under Ward 60, another clash between TMC and Congress workers led the administration to deploy RAF and sniffer dogs. TMC workers fired gunshots and hurled bombs at Congress workers, it is alleged. Upon reports that bombs were kept in the house of Congress candidate Md Nadeem, the police carried out a search and recovered the bombs, which Nadeem’s grandfather alleged had been planted by supporters of TMC candidate, Kaizer Jamil.

Three bombs were hurled at the Congress office on Council House Street, next to the Governor House.

Four bombs were hurled outside the booth at Taki School in Rajabazar.

BJP’s camp office was ransacked and bombs were hurled at Burrabazar’s Kali Krishna Road.

RAF had to be pressed in to bring the situation under control. Incidents of hurling bombs were also reported from Ratan Babu Ghat Road at Cossipore.

Party workers and voters were attacked at Kudghat, Mukundapur and Belgachhia.

Commissioner of Police Surajit Kar Purakayastha said in total 58 people were arrested and 18 crude bombs were recovered.